Many would assume that the Marlins would be bummed after getting no-hit, but Cody Ross had a different approach to the perfect game. “It’s the best pitcher in baseball. It’s not embarrassing,” Cody Ross said. The Marlins are probably going to come out swinging today.

While we are all still thinking about perfection, Jamie Moyer will take the hill against a team he has had so much success against. Moyer is 13-5 with a 3.18 ERA against Florida. At Sun Life Stadium, his ERA is a minuscule 1.66.

Moyer will be opposed by Anibal Sanchez, who has a no hitter on his resume. Sanchez has struggled against the Phillies, going 2-5 with a 5.70 ERA against the Phillies. When he is on, Sanchez has no-hit material, but is wild when he is off. The way the Phillies offense has been going, the edge could go to Sanchez.

This would be a perfect time for the Phillies to turn around their offensive struggles. It would also be a nice time for a sweep.

Your gameday beer: Affligem Blond is a Belgian beer, really my favorite nation for beer. It’s yellow/gold, very light and has somewhat of a banana lace smell. Can’t beat that combination. When facing a guy who has baffled you all his career, you need to rethink strategy, take your time, focus on every little pitch. That makes Affligem Blond a nice beer for tonight. For a food pairing, I’d go with clams. — By Tim

We need the Offense to actually score some runs here. Cant expect Moyer to throw another shut out. 7 runs in the last 7 games (6 earned) is pathetic. I have no doubt the offense will snap out of it, the question is when? It could be a simple as either Utley or Howard hitting a homer (or maybe getting a hit without an error. LOL). If one of them could hit a homer, it could jump start stuff. I hope that the perfect game by Doc yesterday inspired them.

SF Giants Signed Pat Burrell. “The Giants have signed free agent outfielder Pat Burrell to a minor league deal, reports Mychael Urban of CSNBayarea.com. If the former first overall pick were to reach the majors, San Francisco would pay him the pro-rated portion of the major league minimum, or around $300K.”

Considering his #’s as a Ray were around .218 Batting Average, he is lucky he got picked up at all. Can’t really say anything about not playing every day either because he was batting almost every day.

@ Ed R, dont ask when the last time the Phillies hit a Home Run, it will hurt WAY to much. @ Georgie, Ben is out there I think trying to set the record for the most amount men LOB by a Bench player. 6 in game wasnt enough in Halladay get that he lost. But maybe Werth is trying to match that 6 LOB by Ben Fran. Wow, Ben Fran is batting .206 and Werth is down to .298. Hmm, well at least Werth lowered his worth. LOL. Do we sign him now at 16 Mill or wait to see if he dips below .290 and sign him to 13 Mill. LOL. When he Howard and Utley decide to play Major Leagues baseball, watch out.

not 2 weeks ago we had 4 guys hitting over .300. Now not a single guy in the line up tonight is over .300 and the ONLY one over .290 was hitting like .323 about a week ago. What is Milt Thompson doing?

Well Paulino is hitting over .300. Just get this last guy out. Sad thing is, even if he does get this guy out with no more damage, it would be 6IP, 1ER, and unless the Phillies score at least a run in the top half, best case scenario, he gets a no decision.

Especially with Ben Fran and Schneider due up. I think Ben Fran is trying to see if he can get as low as Schneider is. So much for the theory that more at bats for Ben Fran will equal hits, or even a walk.

Ok, well so much for that Run we wanted. I guess we will have to wait and see if the top of the order can do something. I would use Gload here instead of Dobbs. But then again I would use blind midget instead of Dobbs this season. LOL.

Tracey, I think you are being nice to Dobbs. Maybe we can trade for Bruntlett. LOL. Thats really sad. If the Phillies dont take the lead at all, and Moyer takes the loss, I hope Moyer decks Dobbs and Werth…Dobbs for swinging at 4 balls, and Werth for striking out 3 times leaving 4 on base. A few others could use a chot to the face, because apparently they are all sleeping at the plate. So 0 ER scored yesterday and 0 runs today. Thank you Maybin for the error!

teejvee, I said after the Mets series we would be in 2nd within a week. Also Sadly, looks like I was right, even with the two wins. But then again, the Braves played like 8 of their last 2 games against the Pirates. Go figure, of course they won 8 of their last 12 games. @ Tracey, I dont think Dobbs could hit a slow pitch softball.

Sadly Tracey, seeing how the Braves are playing the Pirates tonight, and then playing us, in one of the worst slumps we have seen in a while, I dont think he is wrong. The braves only have to beat us once to knock us out of first. But it is early. The only question is, when will Milt Thompson start talking to the batter (I find it hard to say hitters right now).

first pitch again. Really. When the season started, Howard was patient, and actually getting hits and RBI’s. NOW he swings at almost EVERY first pitch, and look at what is happening. Earth to Milt. Can you pull these guys aside and say wait. Maybe Perlozzo? Anyone?

4 Strike Outs, 6 LOB. and I thought Ben Fran was a rally killer. Werth was ON FIRE for a good month. Now, Well there are no words to describe him. Pathetic is just being too nice. 2 straight games without a single ER. Thank you Maybin. I think everyone on the Phillies excluding Doc Halladay should donate all of the money they made for the game yesterday to Halladay for being perfect, and Maybin for screwing up big time.

What is the lowest amount of ER’s scored in a 10 game streak? I have a strong feeling we might break that record. So far in the last 6 games (including today) the Phillies have score a whopping 3 ER’s. And next we play the Braves, and sadly their pitching staff is far superior to the Marlins and the Mets.

Heading into the 9th, Jamie Moyer the #5 starter had 6IP, 1 ER, 2 SO’s lowered his ERA to 4.26 and he is in line for the loss. Where are all the Moyer haters that says he sucks, and needs 6 runs a game in run support for any wins at all. Too bad Chooch isnt in, I might be confident of a single run. Seeing the 3 up to bat, looks like another 1,2,3 inning.

Zero Patience, Zero Runs. Moyer should be beyond PISSED. The same thing happened two starts ago. Last start was forgettable, but 2 starts ago wasnt much different. If they could at the very least show some sort of patience at the plate, this slump might not be as bad. Now we go to the Braves, who apparently are in the middle of a hot streak, (granted they were playing the Pirates for most of it) and we are in the middle of a Mets in the 2 weeks of the season streak.

When it is talked about Werth being at that top performance level or superstar status as an outfielder, I cannot agree. As being currently seen, Werth goes thru periods of inconsistency both at the bat and and to some degree, in the field and his current one has looked like it has been one of his worst. You never know about this unpredictable Phillies offense. Against the Atlanta pitching staff, they may surprise and break out of this slump. Would be a heck of a surprise if it happened.

It’s so tough to tell whether Milt is a good or horrendously bad hitting coach. On the one hand the offense has been one of the most explosive in the game under his tenure, on the other hand the slumps are consistently some of the worst year on year…

Look on the bright side: taking two out of three while scoring a total of four runs is quite an accomplishment.

If I were RAJ, I’d bring up Domonic Brown to inject some life into this dead lineup, but the Phillies are far too conservative when it comes to promoting prospects. The Braves had no trouble bringing Jason Heyward up to start to season and Stephen Strasburg and Michael Stanton are about to be called up by Washington & Florida respectively.

A heart-wrenching loss. The 47 year old guy Moyer pitched a great game. How do his offensive players explain to him why he had to lose this game? Werth for the Jeltz Award and Howard second. Had their chances and did not come through. Both of them need to work extensively with Milt Thompson to get it back again at the plate.

those teams are in a slightly different position. Brown is no Hewyard but then again no other hitting prospect supposedly has been since A-Rod, Strasburg is possibly a top 30 pitcher without even being in the majors on a team with very little pitching and Stanton is on a team that uses up options for fun…

This major slump of the bats has affected this team mentally. They need some serious help if they are going to get out of this. We’ll be out of first place by the middle of the week, and worse…the Mets will pick up Cliff Lee in a trade in a few weeks. I’m seriously concerned. And someone tell me why anyone cares that Brad Lidge is returning? He sucks, should of been released after he got his first save (when it shouldn’t of been a save, the wind saved the game for him). Make Contreras the new closer and be done with it.

Moyer is overrated and only pitches well against young teams who are fooled by finesse pitches. Its clear Lidge was a one year wonder or just was lucky in 2008, and will never be the same. Kendrick is filth and always has been. These are three Phillies I would try to dump as soon as possible but unfortunately no one will take them and their stinkin salaries.

I disagree NJ. This team obviously needs some kind of infusion here, energy, youth, smarts – something has to get them going. Bringing up the kid, and either creating some ailment for Dobbs or just flat demoting him to make room would be a significant start on Cholly’s part.
What to do about Jayson is another story. I think Jayson needs to sit for more than one game – the offense

DC…if anyone is willing to trade for Ibanez the Phillies will have to eat the overwhelming majority of Ibanez’s contract, so they aren’t going to save much if they can trade Ibanez.

Also Milt Thompson is an awful hitting coach…it’s easy to look like a stud when your guys are hitting, but this team hits because it has the players to do it. But when this team reaches its slump every year Milt does nothing to get it corrected. J-Roll still does the same thing J-Roll does. Howard still can’t hit a breaking ball. Dobb’s still can’t hit anything. These are all things a hitting coach should be able to correct or work on with the players. I see no evidence of that with Milt.

Calling up Brown is a bad idea. He’s never played above AA. Besides, at present he’d only learn from the current Phils how to be impatient at the plate and how not to hit with runners on.

I agree that Dobbs should be sent packing, and Werth needs at least a three day sit-down. The problem with dumping Dobbs, though, is that with Rollins on the DL and Polanco hurting, there’s no one to handle backing up the right side of the infield right now. The problem with benching Werth is that Francisco hasn’t hit worth anything, and Gload might be needed for pinch hitting duties. He’s not God’s gift to outfielders, either.

I can’t blame Manuel for any of his moves right now, even those that might seem dumb. NO ONE on this team is hitting well. Lately, he’s had to choose between horse manure and cow manure.

I don’t see the Mets as having enough to trade for Cliff Lee (unless they plan on including Ike Davis in the deal – which I doubt). It will be interesting to compare the prospects that the Mariners get for Lee to the guys that the Phillies got for him.

I also agree that Milt Thompson is a bad coach, for the reasons cited by Ed R. It’s when a player hits a slump that the coach has to respond and teach and go over video. When a player on the Phils hits a skid, though, he keeps right on skidding until the rest of the lineup is affected. There’s not a team in baseball with so much talent that has gone into extended slumps EVERY YEAR they’ve been together. The only difference between the Phils and the other teams with hitting talent–the ones that don’t have colossal slumps every year–is the hitting coach.

Wow, the perspective some people are putting on this streak is utterly depressing because it’s just the facts. This was to be the year to show what we *can* do since it’s the last time this core with such great potential will be together. Ironic that the biggest concern had been bullpen and now we can’t score runs enough to get games to save; the last thing anyone was worried about was our offense at the plate. Everyone slumping at the same time for so long.. is it really a coaching thing?

its amazing some of the ignorrance on this site. Moyer thows a CH Shut out 2 hitter and “the braves suck”, he throw 6 innings 1 run, and “only pitches well against young teams who are fooled by finesse pitches” Really? I mean come on. he is the #5 pitcher with an ERA ar 4.24 and ONLY ONCE has he NOT pitched 6 innings. Some people need to learn baseball! Not to mention “This major slump of the bats has affected this team mentally.” To say that would be to say that the Pitchers have been affected. Is it just me, or did we win in Game 1, did Roy Halladay throw a perfect game (Do you need everyone to refresh your memory what that is or how big it is?) and did the Phillies Pitchers only give up 1 run in game three? HELLO. The OFFENSE sucks right now, the Pitching so far seems to be holding things together. As for Milt. Well read my comments from the last several games, last several seasons when they were slumping. Milt is a HORRIBLE BATTING coach. I wont even say “hitting” coach. Look at last season, when some players begame to slump, other players pulled them through giving them advice, Milt was too busy joking around to see slump. So the question is with J-Roll out of the lineup, who will be the one who breaks out of the slump, and starts doing the talking?